The Harn Museum of Art presents “Soaring Voices: Contemporary Japanese Women Ceramic Artist an exhibition on view October 16, 2011 – December 31, 2011.

This exhibition features 87 works by 25 exceptional women artists who reflect Japan’s rich and innovative ceramic culture. For thousands of years, women have been highly active in the production of ceramics but their names have largely been unknown. Soaring Voices demonstrates the shift in Japanese society toward individual women artists becoming recognized in an artistic realm traditionally held by men.

The exhibition provides contemporary interpretations of a traditional art form through the work of women artists using a range of methods, materials and motifs, many inspired from the natural world. Soaring Voices features pioneering ceramicists spanning generations, including members of the founding generation of Japanese female potters, such as Asuka Tsubio, Kiyoko Koyama and Takako Araki whose colorful works are innovative in form and concept. Other artists, including Eiko Kishi and Fuku Fukumoto, incorporate ancient literature and Noh traditions to create a context within their work of a deep connection with nature, a significant motif in the work of Japanese artists.

Soaring Voices was developed by The Shigaraki Ceramic Cultural Park, Shiga Prefecture, and hus-10, Inc., Tokyo, Japan and organized for tour by International Arts & Artists, Washington, D.C. The exhibition was generously supported in part by the E. Rhodes & Leona B. Carpenter Foundation and the S&R Foundation. Made possible locally by the AEC Trust.

Image: Etsuko Tashima Cornucopia 03-III, 2003, stoneware and glass.Photo © Taku Saiki.

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